from Persistent to Consistent

Electronic life management…

I’m always on the look-out for the best tools to manage my life. Less time spent managing or trying to hang on to things in my head means more time for creativity and thinking… I simply like to be organised so that I can relax. Here are some highly recommended tools to help organise your ‘stuff’… Remember, if you’re managing your trading as a business (and you should be) then you need to be organised enough to dedicate time to it.

To Do list – Google Market App – ASTRID

Simply the best to-do list manager for Android phones which sync’s with google tasks. Coming soon to a PC screen near you also. I have no idea what the heck ‘Social Productivity’ might be but you can check it out here: www.astrid.com or www.weloveastrid.com (apologies, I don’t own an iPhone)

Brain-storming and mind mapping – TheBrain

Simply awesome and hugely powerful for recording absolutely everything about a subject, a number of subjects and everything going on in your head. All your ideas and crazy dreams can all go in here and it’s visible and interlinked. I am a huge believer in mind-maps and brainstorming so I’m a big fan of this (having tired all the other ones). More on The Brain in posts to come but go have a look here as it’s free to trial

Trade recording – Filemaker

Now, I am not an IT wizard so don’t have anything near the patience or skills to get my head around SQL or attempt to do this myself, however, those nice people at Filemaker have done it for me. I use a database to record my trades and analysis – not a spreadsheet. More on this shortly about why and how it works for me but you can go check it out here.

And finally, unless you’re using a Mac, for your own sanity and peace of mind (if you’ve not already done this) you need to go upgrade your kit to run Windows 7. No, really, it’s about time. I know it’s alot to pay for a toolbar 😉 but actually means having a lot of charts open it’s really easy to manage what you’re doing. Regret not upgrading from Vista a lot sooner.

So hopefully that’s useful to some people. Next up (Wed?) will be part 1 of 6 on ‘Teaching yourself to trade‘ which can apply to anything (but of course using trading as an example) and references tricks and tips I’ve used to achieve successful outcomes in learning a new thing.